


Artifice

by SQ (proteinscollide)



Category: Pop Music RPF
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-04-26
Updated: 2005-04-26
Packaged: 2017-10-24 05:23:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/259464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/proteinscollide/pseuds/SQ
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>Something filled up my heart with nothing<br/>Someone told me not to cry<br/>But now that I’m older my heart is colder<br/>And I can see that it’s a lie.</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	Artifice

**Author's Note:**

> Summary from Wake Up by Arcade Fire

“Why do you think NSYNC is so successful?” This journalist is thin and blonde, young enough to be as enthusiastic as her intended audience. The questions aren’t meant to be hard, because her heart isn’t.

“The fans,” Lance says, syrup slow and smiling. He’s sprawled across one corner of the soft couch, arm reaching across behind Justin’s head towards Joey.

“The music,” Justin says, almost on top of Lance’s answer. He means it.

“The friendship between us,” Joey says. On the other end of the couch, one of his hands stretches out towards Lance, a frame.

“Because we don’t spend all our money on crack whores. We get them for free from people like you.” Chris, mouthing off as usual. In the finished article that they scan between one press event and another, JC notices that Chris’ answer is something mundane and entirely untrue.

JC finds himself hesitating as the fast paced round of polished answers swings across to him.

“Ambition,” he says finally. Their handler shoots him a glare from behind the trendy-for-a-week haircut of their interviewer, and breaks in to say, “What JC means is - ”

JC doesn’t catch what words she’s putting into his mouth, in place of his moment of honesty. He remembers instead fingers stroking the side of his face, sitting on a shabby couch in a studio in LA just a few years ago, a gruff voice saying, “You’re gonna go far one day because you must want it so badly, don’t you, boy?” A hand on his head, a hand on his crotch.

The pretty journalist scrawls quickly and briefly on the page before her, then glances up and says perkily, “OK! If you hadn’t become a pop star, what do you think you would’ve done?”

“Astronaut,” Lance says immediately, and another round of predictable sound bites starts again.

*

In the car, the driver has the radio at audible hum – a bassline here, a hook, every second word spoken by the brash DJs. A generic Latin-infused pop song is followed by the forced jollity of the back announcement. JC misses the song title and the artist, but he catches the unmistakeable derision that follows. “Another solo stab by a boybander desperate for that little extra bit of fame…how long do you give this one before the crash and burn? Ring up and tell us on - ”

JC leans forward and says to the driver, “Hey, can you turn that off?” The silence propels him back to his seat. “It was interfering with the song in my head,” JC says, off Carlos’ look.

“Yeah man, I bet it was.” Carlos looks away.

JC looks out the open window beside him, at the line of offices and high rises, the monuments of men who planned and built their own monuments.

“I could’ve been an architect,” JC murmurs, staring at the cool-panelled buildings sliding by, an artifice of glass.

“I coulda been a contender,” Carlos says in a terrible imitation of Brando, his hoarse laugh breaking into the sentence early.

JC winces and presses hard on the button, wishing the tinted windows shut quicker, hiding the outside world from view.

END


End file.
